Santa Fe Passage

Disgraced Indian scout and his sidekick lead a wagon train carrying freight through Kiowa country to Mexico. John Payne is the scout, Slim Pickens is his sidekick and Rod Cameron and Faith Domergue are the wagon train "bosses". Director William Witney was an expert at making tight, fast-moving westerns, but he had a bad day here. Except for a well-handled wild-horse stampede and a couple of slightly less well-handled Indian attacks, this picture moves like molasses, with performances ranging from enjoyable (Pickens) to stiff (Cameron) to indifferent (Domergue) to awful (Irene Tedrow as a Kiowa "squaw" accompanying Domergue on the train). Payne looks like he'd rather be somewhere else and doesn't connect at all with Domergue, his ostensible love interest. Only Pickens and Leo Gordon as a villainous (what else?) trail boss manage to breathe any life into their characters, and the script holds no surprises for anyone (especially the "twist" ending). An OK time-waster, that's about all.